Team India are primed to commence their Border Gavaskar Trophy tour to Australia on the 22nd of November. However, they will miss Rohit Sharma the skipper who is on paternity leave after welcoming his second child.
In that case, India may consider opening with Yashasvi Jaiswal and a fit KL Rahul or Abhimanyu Eashwaran in the first Test. According to the former batting great Sunil Gavaskar, the Indian management will play safe and pick the experienced Rahul for the first Test even though the left-handed batsman has been below par recently.
Rahul last year scored an exceptional century during an away Test match in Centurion, South Africa, and Gavaskar remains optimistic that the 32-year-old will score a similar innings in Australia.
“KL Rahul, last year’s opening batsman, scored one of the best centuries that I have ever seen in my life in South Africa, so doing that here won’t be a problem for him,” the great man mentioned.
“Like all batters, he will need some luck at the start and if he gets that he can get the team off to a solid opening,” added Gavaskar.
According to Gavaskar, the best bowlers of the team should be selected for the Test even if it requires an inclusion of two spinners.
‘Test Match or Test Cricket, I don’t care how the pitch will play. I mean Test Match, I think you have to pick the best bowlers’, he stated.
‘With Ashwin and Jadeja in the team, we still have bowlers who boast of nearly 900 wickets between them. Not to forget that the two also have more than six Test hundreds between them’, Gavaskar went on.
‘While they might not expect much assistance from the pitch, their skill and experience are able to in fact slow down the shine and focus of the batter,’ said the 75-year-old.
Newcomers such as and Jaiswal, Dhurv Jurel, Nitish Reddy and Devdutt Padikkal may experience a Test series for the first time in Australia, and Gavaskar expressed that the little mortars have been well prepared for such bouncy surfaces.
“Let us hope the coaches have prepared them for playing above the waist and for playing away from the lines in their batting on high bouncing pitches,” Gavaskar elucidated.
“In contrast to India, they have to make more use of the crease and be on the back foot quite a bit more,” he explained.
The former captain of the Indian team further stated that the Indian team has the psychological strength to overcome the setback that they suffered from New Zealand during the series before the home series and would rather concentrate on the task that is at hand in Australia.
“All the mature players have this ability. Just as a batsman is taught not to think about the last ball but rather to prepare himself for the next, smart teams do not think about the last test match rather they prepare for the next one,” he stated.
“Given the experience in this team, I am positive they will make sure the younger ones will be thinking of the next one and not of the last,” summed up Gavaskar.
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